On Sunday, 13 Iraqis were killed and dozens injured
in Baghdad when US helicopters fired on a crowd of unarmed civilians.
G2 columnist Ghaith Abdul-Ahad, who was injured in the attack, describes
the scene of carnage - and reveals just how lucky he was to walk away

Media reporting of suicide bombings in Israel and
the occupied Palestinian territories are rightly given much coverage,
but the necessary context and background information are almost always
totally absent

There are clusters of Israeli soldiers on every
street corner of Al Shuhadah Street for a 5km periphery around Hebron's
Old City and the holy burial grounds, the Cave. Welcome to Hebron, the
frontline in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict

We are all economic animals first, and religious
identities second, and political entities third. Perhaps this reality
has struck our fundamentalists, which is why they so often resort to
demagoguery, rather than facts

Scientists are claiming that the unprecedented
ferocity and frequency of the hurricanes that have battered the Caribbean
this year can be blamed on one factor: the unexpectedly warm water that
has been building up in the Atlantic over the past year

Hindus and Muslims must pursue the path of reconciliation.
Prejudices and suspicions are counterproductive; camaraderie among them
is essential for both development and integration. Each has to help
the other to make the country strong and prosperous

Towering waves the height of two storey buildings
and winds of more than 100mph announced the arrival of Hurricane Ivan
in Jamaica last night after wreaking havoc in Grenada, where 29 people
lost their lives and 90% houses were damaged

If the present growth rates were maintained for Muslims to outnumber
Hindus in India, it will take 247 years and by that date India's population
would be about 158 billion!!! So the sangh parivaar can exit the panic
mode

The struggle for justice should never be abandoned
because of the apparent overwhelming power of those who have the guns
and the money and who seem invincible in their determination to hold
on to it. That apparent power has, again and again, proved vulnerable
to human qualities less measurable than bombs and dollars

It seems secularism is becoming a distant dream
in view of increasing communalisation of our politics. Those who strive
for inter-religious harmony will have to face increasing challenges
in coming days

"Crusade. I remember a momentary feeling of
vertigo at the President's use of that word, the outrageous ineptitude
of it. The vertigo lifted, and what I felt then was fear, sensing not
ineptitude but exactitude. "

There may be a few foreign volunteers from other
Muslim countries involved in the struggle, but this is not part of some
international terrorist conspiracy. It is not even a Russian-Chechen
war, really. It is Putin's war, and you can't "decontextualise"
that

India's growth rate has leapt above six per cent,
but this is about capital, not labour, about liberated profits, not
people. All the talk about a new high-tech India storming the barricades
of the first world is based largely on myth

As long as the Sharon government, with the active
encouragement of President Bush, goes on enlarging the settlements,
building the Wall and all the other actions of annexation, there is
no way to convince Palestinian public opinion to turn its back on violence

The aim of every parent is to forge a world in
which their children can find peace. The impact of the Beslan crime
goes beyond horror for the murdered, or pity for the living. We see,
in the agony of strangers, the threat to all our tomorrows

Western "management gurus" have recognised
the value of a diversified work force and management structure. In contrast,
Indian companies continue, by and large, to operate in terms of traditional
values; even as they begin to compete in the world, their feet remain
mired in the mud of centuries of privilege

The doctors of the Imam Ali general hospital in
Sadr City struggle against supply shortages and risk death to treat
both the wounded and the many suffering from disease in the slum, where
pools of sewage fill potholes and dead animals decay in the streets

The Berlin wall was smashed and the debris sold
as souvenirs to foreign and local tourists. A really sharp operator
would now be applying for a concession to sell off chunks when this
walls time comes